Welcome and come on in. Let’s get settled with a cup of tea or coffee and we’ll have a chat. How is your weather? Australia is in the midst of a heat wave. The tour down under bike race was cancelled for two days because it was dangerously hot. The Australian Open Tennis however, was not cancelled and players had to perform in temperatures above 40 degrees celsius. Novak Djokovic and Gael Monfils both complained, one saying he was dying on court. There is talk of reviewing the extreme temperature rule but not until this years event is completed. Naturally with this level of heat with the addition of wind fires are breaking out but hopefully they will be quickly contained. What is more frightening is the number of parents leaving their little children locked in cars. On one day alone ten children had to be rescued and yesterday another four with one now in hospital in a serious condition. Every one needs to be aware that heat kills. Check your elderly neighbours. Give pets ice in their water. For us here on the Sunshine Coast where we expect hot weather, we have been let off lightly with so far only two days of extreme heat.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you that we have been putting up shade cloths so that we can walk on the tiles out by our pool and sit at the table there. Without shade it is impossible. We started off with one sail but that didn’t give us the coverage we needed so we ordered another. With age any project we do seems to take on a slapstick element to it. Neither of us have the hand strength any more to open a soft drink bottle let alone cut wire with wire cutters. (I even had to return a fly spray to Aldi because neither of us could depress the spray button. It must be faulty we thought until the cash register girl easily pressed and got a spray which filled the shop. I demonstrated my powers and she gave me my money back). Every swage we did had to be undone and the list goes on but finally we have our sails up and they work well.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you that I took my mother to see the film “The Post.” with Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks produced by Steven Spielberg. The film was based on a true story about the Washington Post, the first ever female publisher of an American newspaper and secrets about the Vietnam War. I have poor attention span when watching films or television and it really has to grab me from the start and keep that grab going for me to stay awake. The start worked but then it became a bit slow for me and off I went to sleep. I don’t think I was asleep for too long and the rest of the film was good. It is interesting too, watching history you remember. My Mum and the other lady we took both loved it in its entirety. One aspect I really enjoyed seeing was the inside workings of newspaper printing. My ex brother in law used to be a typesetter – a job now no longer in existence. It was wonderful revisiting this process and wondering at how much times have changed.

If we were having coffee I’d tell you that I am in the process of installing an automatic watering system. My husband told me not to do it but I never do what I’m told so I purchased the equipment needed without telling him and started the installation whilst he was at golf. He was not as upset as I had expected him to be but he also refuses to learn how to use it so when I thought 2:00 was minutes and was in reality hours he had no idea how to turn it off (if he would have done anyway) and used it as an ‘I told you so’ of the pointlessness of having a system. He will come round. I haven’t quite finished but will by the time we head off on our cruise to New Guinea ( 19 days 5 hours and 5 minutes).

If we were having coffee I’d tell you that nothing else has happened in my life. I am writing, reading and trying to get fit. A hint I was given for helping with my eating was that a slice of pineapple a day will stave off cravings for sweet things. I have been doing this and I have to say I don’t feel the same need I did before and have cut them down.

Enough about me. How was your week? Has your weather been warmer/colder, wetter/drier. Have you read any good books or seen any good films? Thank you for dropping in for coffee, it is lovely to see you. Thanks to eclecticali who is our host of the weekend coffee share.

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About Irene Waters 19 Writer Memoirist

I began my working career as a reluctant potato peeler whilst waiting to commence my training as a student nurse. On completion I worked mainly in intensive care/coronary care; finishing my hospital career as clinical nurse educator in intensive care. A life changing period as a resort owner/manager on the island of Tanna in Vanuatu was followed by recovery time as a farmer at Bucca Wauka. Having discovered I was no farmer and vowing never again to own an animal bigger than myself I took on the Barrington General Store. Here we also ran a five star restaurant. Working the shop of a day 7am - 6pm followed by the restaurant until late was surprisingly more stressful than Tanna. On the sale we decided to retire and renovate our house with the help of a builder friend. Now believing we knew everything about building we set to constructing our own house. Just finished a coal mine decided to set up in our backyard. Definitely time to retire we moved to Queensland. I had been writing a manuscript for some time. In the desire to complete this I enrolled in a post grad certificate in creative Industries which I completed 2013. I followed this by doing a Master of Arts by research graduating in 2017. Now I live to write and write to live.

22 Responses to Weekend Coffee Share 21st January 2018

Good day to stop by for a cuppa! I’m not at all surprised to find you don’t do as you are told because you have both a capable mind and practical hands. Yes, your husband will come around once it’s all running smoothly. The Post has an interesting correlation to newspapers today in that it examines how we manage to tell controversial or government-related news. I believe that reporting of the Vietnam War changed in the US with newspaper siding more with presenting the truth rather than protecting government secrets. However, we could chat over several cups about the topic! My first job in newsprint at age 17 was a typesetter. I can’t tell you how happy I am that job no longer exists. Oh, another cruise! I’m dreaming of one in your southern hemisphere, too — so much snow in my area.

Lovely to have you drop by for a chat Charli. Sadly I have a more pessimistic view of newspaper reporting today than you do. I think that the man at the top sides with one sphere of government (or the other) and the paper reports positively along the side of the one that is in favour. I also wonder at how much propaganda we are fed and what is kept from us. I’ll never forget being in Switzerland at the same time as my brother’s father in law who lives in North Carolina. My brother gets the International Version of the New York Times and on reading it F-I-L expressed surprise at an article (can’t remember what) and said “this hasn’t been reported at all in the NYT at home.
I’ll bet my ex B-I-L also thinks that re the typsetting but it was an amazing process.
You can come in my suitcase but I am a little concerned that we are heading further north in cyclone season and into the equatorial heat. At least indoors will be air conditioned. Thanks for dropping by and have a good week.

I’m still skeptical of newspaper publishers and their agendas but I do know that journalism is considered to be an objective style of reporting news. The tension it creates, and the politics involved and the marketability of news sources to readers and advertising dollars make it an imperfect mess. Yikes! You stay cool and safe!

Thanks. We are pleased with it and although the colour is bright I like it. We were wanting to kill ants rather than flies – they have been driving us mad. Not getting into food so much but they seem to be attracted by ghecko poo and the walls are black with them. (we have a lot of gheckos that we don’t want to go.) I’m sure you will see lots of photos but possibly not while we are on the cruise. I’m too Scottish to pay the amount they want for internet service so I will probably have two weeks absence.

I can’t believe that there are still people who would leave their kids in the car on a hot day! The older i get, the more serious I am taking my weight/strength training. It doesn’t take much to lose muscle mass. Glad you were able to get the project done and get a little shade. Stay cool!

We will (stay cool). Yes I don’t think that even the most stupid of people have any excuse for not knowing a car will become like an oven in a short space of time. I have just signed up with a PT who is going to concentrate on weight training I think so here’s hoping. Stay warm.

You reminded me of last summer when I bought a can of spray to kill off wasps in my front porch. I waited until it was dark and as cool as it would get before spiking again. Then I didn’t have enough strength to depress it! I ended up having to call my daughter, telling her it didn’t work. If course, she needed hardly any effort to spray it!

What a complete delight to wake up to and read. I cannot find my plus 1s in this dinge but turning my phone to a landscape position helped bring your text further to my eyes and away I went enjoying that coffee with you..
The sails, both, look splendid and effective; horrific these stories of children left in cars. Parents who do that in your heat should be… No I won’t say that out loud.
I adore that you bought your water system even though husband had said no. Girl power and your self-esteem is on fire. The minor point about briefly misunderstanding the timings is nothing worse than a learning curve, and I love those 🌸

I have continued meeting new writers on here and am now up to over 50 posts! (You can’t really count two from last night – that was just me on a learning curve).
But my following is growing and while I’m not particularly into quantity (I think quality is far superior) I am slightly excited to find I now have 170 of them .. all stopped by for a quick peruse.
I am attempting to write a novel. There I said it 😱.
I joined the UK Romantic Novelists Association.. ‘new writers scheme’ .. they take 300 a year. A little ole me got in💃🏼.
Except now I have to write. 80,000 words by August!!!!
I’ve got 20,000 from my NaNo efforts and have decided to edit, slice then develop this piece.
I fear it is going to be a little dark for their eyes though. I may be thrown out of the tea and cakes party. “Door is that way dear – you appear to be in the wrong genre”
But I’ve got to write what’s in my head. Don’t you think?
Lovely coffee by the way. Can we do this again? 🌸

Glad to have you join me for coffee Viola. My husband often orders me not to do things and I rarely if ever obey. It makes him cranky but he gets over it. I tell him he should be glad that I go ahead and do my own thing as it shows that I have no fear of him and trust that he knows (and I also) that it will not make or break our love for each other. We do happen to think along the same lines when it comes to what I consider important issues.
You are doing well with your posting and followers. Don’t say you are attempting just say you are writing a novel and congratulations on being taken in to the UK Romantic Novelists Association. Personally I love having deadlines being a goal oriented deadline driven person. You’ll do it – if blogging doesn’t overtake you. Unfortunately there are guidelines you have to follow if you want to be published as a genre writer and from my understanding romance is one of the most rigid. Fifty Shades of Grey may have challenged that a little so go for it. Write your novel and if they won’t publish it there are always other avenues.
Look forward to seeing you again Viola. I’ll follow your progress and look forward to reading the finished book. have a good week. I enjoyed coffee also.

Hi Irene,
We’ve been hit with a few hot blasts from the heat wave but have air-con in hte loune so it’s not too bad. Took the dogs for a run at the beach when it was almost dark last night due to the heat. If we could only harness a fraction of their energy, we’d be going gangbusters. Zac jumped from rock to rock with great speed, seemingly oblivious to the dangers and wobbled a little but was otherwise fine. The pups are needing more training but puppy school is $200 a pop and beyond our budget so I might have to recruit my friend who is fostering guide dog puppies and pick up a few tips. Rosie is chewing everything and anything. Off to the butcher for some bones tomorrow.
I smiled reading about your comments about your husband and the watering system.
Hope you have a great week.
Best wishes,
Rowena

Hope the weather has cooled a little now Rowena. We still have been lucky but would love to see some rain. I’m sure you could almost have your own puppy school with each of you taking a pup or dog. Good luck. The chewing I remember from Muffin but luckily one day she just stopped. Lots of toys and keeping everything out of the way helped and I found a reindeer antler was fantastic. Kept her occupied for hours and never wore down.
Hope you have a great week. Cheers Irene

I really do like what you’ve done with your garden – the orange is a vivid and happy color. And I;m a bit envious you can take your mom to the movies – I can’t do that with mine anymore, though she loves the performers who come to the residence where she lives. This week an amazing pianist played about 30 favorite pieces, all ragtime style in his own arrangements. He took such delight in playing for this appreciative crowd.

Decades ago I met my husband when hoping for a position in the art department of a printing shop. I was in college and needed a summer job. That industry has long since been a digital one, but we had to burn the printing metal plates with carbon arc electrodes, making contact and causing a brilliant light – a fire – that burned a negative image onto the plate. This created the offset plate from which all text and images were printed. I was excellent at burning but it scared the hell out of me – very hot, and it was dangerous to look at the burning electrodes. A bit different technique from the way newspapers employed typesetting, though the company did some of that also. Also a defunct industry now. Anyway, we’re looking forward to see The Post.

We finally got some rain a few weeks ago which we appreciated but it also caused deadly mudslides in the areas devastated by fired the months before.
Have a wonderful upcoming week, Irene.

Yes we like the colour for its vibrancy. I’m sorry that you have lost those moments that I now treasure with my Mum. It is fantastic that there are people in the world that are happy to entertain older people and with memory loss often music still touches them.
Worksafe would have a field day with that job you used to have. I think I would have perfected the art of not being that great at it but perhaps as you were so good at it you were the safest with it as well.
Yes the mudslides were horrendous – we saw them here. One thing leads to another. Glad you got some needed rain though.
Have a good week Sharon.

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Irene Waters

I began my working career as a reluctant potato peeler whilst waiting to commence my training as a student nurse. On completion I worked mainly in intensive care/coronary care; finishing my hospital career as clinical nurse educator in intensive care. A life changing period as a resort owner/manager on the island of Tanna in Vanuatu was followed by recovery time as a farmer at Bucca Wauka. Having discovered I was no farmer and vowing never again to own an animal bigger than myself I took on the Barrington General Store. Here we also ran a five star restaurant. Working the shop of a day 7am - 6pm followed by the restaurant until late was surprisingly more stressful than Tanna. On the sale we decided to retire and renovate our house with the help of a builder friend. Now believing we knew everything about building we set to constructing our own house. Just finished a coal mine decided to set up in our backyard. Definitely time to retire we moved to Queensland. I had been writing a manuscript for some time. In the desire to complete this I enrolled in a post grad certificate in creative Industries which I completed 2013. I followed this by doing a Master of Arts by research graduating in 2017. Now I live to write and write to live.